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| Lindsey Graham (Image via Wikipedia) |
Read related » On immigration, Lindsey Graham abandons principleAs a naturalized American citizen, by virtue of my having been a 13-year-old minor at the time that my parents were naturalized (i.e., Derivative American Citizenship), I am probably more cognizant than most people of the great privilege that American citizenship bestows. Next to my birth and my survival in Europe during, and in the aftermath of, the Second World War, my American naturalization is the best thing that ever happened to me. Besides my wife's heart, my most precious possession is my Certificate of American Citizenship.
[Reading this related article in its entirety is recommended.]
“It is stunning -- just stunning -- that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has apparently joined the movement to revoke birthright citizenship. "People come here to have babies," he says. "They come here to drop a child. It’s called 'drop and leave.' " After years of being a lonely voice of Republican sanity on immigration, Graham has decided to embrace the supreme symbol of nativism -- changing the Fourteenth Amendment to restrict American citizenship. He has either taken leave of his senses or of his principles. Neither is unknown in Washington. Politicians sometimes come here to drop their deepest convictions. It’s called self-serving cynicism. The authors of the Fourteenth Amendment guaranteed citizenship to all people “born or naturalized in the United States” for a reason. They wished to directly repudiate the Dred Scott decision, which said that citizenship could be granted or denied by political caprice. They purposely chose an objective standard of citizenship -- birth -- that was not subject to politics. Reconstruction leaders established a firm, sound principle: To be an American citizen, you don’t have to please a majority, you just have to be born here.”
— By Michael Gerson | July 30, 2010 (washingtonpost.com)
I think that Senator Graham has neither "taken leave of his senses" nor "of his principles". I believe, instead, that like many other natural born American citizens, he has taken his citizenship for granted. The old saying about "the best things in life are free" can be overstated, but certainly not when it comes to American citizenship. It bestows all the wonderful Constitutional rights to every innocent person who is either born or naturalized in America.
The key flaw in Graham's proposal is the transference of the biblical "sins of the fathers" onto the secular innocent child. Even monsters like Hitler, Mao, and I'madinnerjacket were innocent at birth.
Post 1,372 Give me your tired, your poor, and your innocent
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